The Wangless Angel

On the countertop, just to the left of the sink, a statue of a naked angel resides in my bathroom. He is rather elongated, tall, with his head tilted back and one arm reaching up towards the heavens.

I gave him the name 'Forsaken Angel', because apparently, he was left behind after participating in quite a battle. One of his wings has been torn off. Both hands are missing. His feet are mired in some kind of molten goo that keeps him bound to the Earth. A snake twines around his body, holding him back; and when you look at him, with his head tilted back and his arm raised, you just know he is asking for divine help.

Art that satisfies makes you ask questions. And, this piece makes you ask, "Will he get the help he is asking for?" "Will he be saved?" "Will he be cared for after his sacrifices made in battle?" You look into his face and get the answer, "Yes." This is satisfying art. Our daughter, Carrie, made it in her first sculpting class at college. It is the one piece of her work that I asked to have when she moved out. I told her it was payback for her weighing ten pounds at birth.


Have you ever wondered if anything you say to your kids sticks in their heads after you say it? Well. It does. My kids were always asking me questions with complicated answers, although they never asked me why the sky was blue. Hmmm. Oh, well.

Some of the questions I could answer right away, some I had to look up, and some of them I just had no idea what to tell them. But, I did not ever want them to think I couldn't help them with their questions, so I kinda gave them answers...but not really.

Now, the other day I'm looking at this naked angel in the bathroom; I mean, I've seen him six or seven times every day, sometimes more if it's the day after we have chili and, after all these years, I notice, really notice.....he has no wang.

And just then, a flash from the past hits me. Smacks me right upside the noggin.

When Carrie was about 12 or 13, she asked me if boy angels had wangs. Yes, she said wang. It was the popular slang at the time. Well, of course, I can't really answer a question like that, so I
give her one of my non-answers. I tell her, "If boy angels have to pee, then they have wangs, but I don't know if angels pee or not." She considers this non-answer answer for a moment, and then says, "Okay," and leaves. Another crisis averted and it all sinks into memory for a dozen or more years.

So, now, as I look at the wangless angel, I realize that all those years ago Carrie decided for herself that angels don't pee and that, yes, she was listening. It's nice to learn she was paying attention and makes me believe some of the other stuff, the good, important stuff I told my kids, stuck with them.

As a side note, the wangless angel does have a butt crack. I don't know where that detail came from because I do not recall the subject of angel butt cracks ever coming up between this parent and that child.

Big Soup

We had Big Soup for supper tonight. For St. Patrick's Day I usually cook up a huge pot of Corned Beef and Cabbage. Or as my family has always called it: Big Soup.


Big Soup is what my sister, Jean, named any kind of a boiled dinner after she saw the stewing pot full of whole vegetables and a single chunk of meat burbling in the broth. She was only a few years old at the time.

Now, a New England Boiled Dinner is poor people food. You know, sometimes poor people eat pretty dang good.

Anyhoo, my mom would cook up a boiled dinner two or three times a month. She most often used a ham. She would put this huge hunk of meat in a humongous stewing pot and cook it all day. By the time I got home from school, the kitchen was all steamy and you could almost taste the air.



At four o'clock, mom would add the vegetables. First, in went 2 or 3 small, whole, peeled onions. Scrubbed potatoes, whole, with the skins left on, were put into the bubbling pot next. Then whole peeled carrots went in. Last in was the quartered cabbage.

By five o'clock, it was done. My mom was a farmer's daughter so we ate farmer food on a farmer's time schedule. Dad, who was not a farmer, didn't seem to mind and neither did any of the rest of us. We ate our meal with thick slices of crusty Balkan bread to soak up the juice. I think they call it 'artisan' bread now. La-di-da.

Anyway, all this was going through my mind today while I was in the kitchen making Big Soup with corned beef and cabbage.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Mr. Flowerchild Finds Himself

It takes so little to amuse some people. And I, in turn, am amused at their amusement.

Take, for instance, Mr. Flowerchild and the GPS given to him by our eldest child.

Kid #1 bought this little device two summers ago in preparation for his and his girlfriend's move from Michigan to Arizona. "In case we get lost in the desert, Ma," he told me and I just gave him a look because I knew it was all bullshit.

First of all, he knows how to use a regular ole map. Second of all, he knows not to get off the road in an unfamiliar area. Third of all, he just wanted to buy a new toy. Eh, it's his money.

Only, after it came by UPS, the kid is a little unhappy with the device....it doesn't do all the things he wanted it to do. It was hard, but I kept my mouth shut. I don't know what the big deal is about these GPS things anyway. I mean, how long have we been on this planet without knowing where we are at every given moment and managed to survive? My god, it's like it's the end of the human race or something if you don't have one of these things.

Really. I reckon if you don't know where the hell you are, you got no business being there in the first place. I, for one, know where I am and have always been able to locate myself without having some wee machine tell me.

Anyhoo, Kid#1 has a friend named Ralph who has more money than he knows what to do with and also likes to buy toys like GPS's. Ralph didn't like his first one so be bought a different one and, since his first one was about ten time fancier that the one Kid#1(always monetarily challenged) had just bought, Ralph very kindly gave him the cast off.

So, instead of returning the less-than-perfect GPS, Kid#1 gives it to his dad.

Again, I keep my mouth shut. I would have returned it and used the refunded money for the trip. But, again, eh, it's his money and what do I know?

So, now Mr. Flowerchild has a GPS and knows where he is all the time. I, of course, already know where he is. Usually, he's on the couch. The only difference between now and when he didn't have a GPS is that now, eleven satellites know he is on the couch, too.

Sometimes he walks around the backyard with his little GPS held out in front of him. He likes to try and see if he can fool those eleven satellites. "Oh! They found me!" he'll say, and then move to the front yard to see what happens there.

They find him.

They always do.

He likes to take it for rides in the truck with him, too. Takes it fishing and back and forth to work. Heck, they even go see Grandma together. He spends a lot of time with his new best friend and I would be jealous except, fortunately, I'm still sane.

Actually, I'm somewaht stunned that he has adopted this little piece of technology. He has a kind of phobia about computers and the like. The kids and I often accuse him of being stuck in the past....somewhere in 1963 as far as we can reckon....so this fascination he has for the GPS gives me hope that one day he might learn how to make the remote for the DVD player work.

In the meantime, I am just going to have fun watching him find himself. Maybe one of these days I might tell him what a good memory his new best friend has...that every place he goes a tiny map is permanently etched into a little memory chip. So if he ever goes some place he shouldn't oughta, not only will eleven satellites know he's been naughty, I will, too.

Christmas Tree, Oh, Christmas Tree!

I love trees in general. Yeah. I've hugged 'em. Deal with it. So, my affection for Christmas trees should come as no surprise. Even though I do not follow the Christian faith, I have come to understand not being Christian does not necessarily stop anyone from putting up a Christmas tree. It has become, I think, a kind of generic symbol of gift-giving.

But, I am not putting up a tree this year. Actually, I haven’t put up a tree for a number of years. It’s not because I can’t afford one. It’s not because I don’t have the time. It’s not because I don’t have the room. And it's definitely not because I don't find them beautiful. It’s just because.

When I was a kid, we always had a real tree in the house at Christmas time. We usually bought our tree from the Kiwanis who set up business in the far end of the IGA parking lot every December. We never spent more than five dollars. Anything more than that, well, you were just showing off and besides that, we lived in Michigan, for cripe’s sake. Pine trees were everywhere and are still. Actually, there are several Christmas tree farms near where I live. They're really low maintenance concerns because you don’t hafta build a fence around them to keep them from wandering away. A Christmas tree pretty much stays where you plant it.

Anyhoo. My mother and I would go pick out a tree about two weeks before Christmas. She always insisted on a Scotch pine because it had the nicest smell. The Kiwanis guy would shove it into the trunk of what ever Pontiac Dad was driving that year and Mom and I would bring it home, the trunk lid bobbing up and down the whole way because we always forgot to bring a piece of rope to tie the lid down.

When we got home, we would bring the tree into the ‘mud room’ and stick it in a bucket of water. We’d leave it there over night. Mom said it was so the tree could relax and get used to being inside because trees were outside things and it was difficult for them to make the change. She said even though the tree had been cut away from its root, its spirit was still alive and it was our responsibility now to care for that spirit as long as we could. Yep. My Mom was an old Injun hippie from way back before hippies were invented.

Well, that tree would soak up that entire bucket of water and the whole house would have a lovely pine scent by morning. Mom was right about Scotch pines having the nicest smell. They also have the crookedest trunk. The air would turn blue with cuss words while my Dad tried to fit that crooked trunk into the tree stand. It was my job to stand exactly ten feet away, and not move an inch, and tell him when the tree was straight up and down and yeah, I know it was a ruse to keep me out of his way!

Getting the tree to stand up straight was a very long process and usually took until lunchtime, whereupon whatever direction the tree was leaning in, it was forever to remain that way as was decreed by Dad. That was the only day of the year Dad would get to have a beer with his lunch. But, an amazing thing would happen while Dad and I were slurping up our noodle soup. When we went back to look at the tree, it was straight! Mom would be standing next to it, smiling, telling us what a great job we had done.

Somehow, the tree got decorated. I remember stringing popcorn together…yards and yards of it…and I was allowed to put on a few ornaments, but, Mom did most of it. Her special touch was to put those long strands of shiny, silvery, ‘icicles’ on every last branch. She would put them on, one by one, placed just so. Our trees always shimmered.

And finally, Mom would cover up the tree stand not with a fancy tree skirt, but with one or two plain white sheets. She would fold and fuss with them, spread them out and around, and when she was done, it looked like our tree was standing in a drift of freshly fallen snow.

After many years I came to realize decorating a Christmas tree was Mom's ‘thing’…it was what brought her some kind of personal happiness. I didn’t think about that back then, though. I was a kid and big thoughts would come later. Back then, it was enough just to be awed by the beautiful tree that was inside our house, that smelled so nice, that shimmered and sparkled in a drift of snow. I couldn’t wait until after supper and it would be dark enough to plug in the lights. Wow! There just wasn’t anything more spectacular than a Christmas tree lit up like, well, like a Christmas tree.

About a week after Christmas, we would take the tree down. Everything would come off and be packed away except for some strands of tinsel and the strings of popcorn. They stayed put. Then, we’d take that tree outside and stand it up against the garage. Mom would tie on little pieces of suet and the birds that didn’t fly south for the winter had a nice place to come for a feed. It was always entertaining to watch the brilliant red cardinals and noisy blue jays visit that tree throughout the winter and spring months and always a delight to spot a string or two of tinsel woven into a new nest.

By the first of May most of the needles had fallen off the tree and landed directly on the soil beneath, where in a few weeks time some acid loving flowers would bloom. On Memorial Day, what remained of our tree became part of the yard and garden cleanup bonfire. Its spirit was finally let go. We had done our best by it and had not been wasteful.

When I was nineteen, my Mom died, and afterward, putting up Christmas trees became such an emotionally painful chore for me, that I stopped. It wasn’t until I had children of my own that I rediscovered the joy of it. Now that they are grown and out of the house, once again, I don’t put up a tree at Christmastime. I enjoy looking at the decorated trees belonging to other people though, and when they ask me about mine, I tell them I like to keep my Christmas trees outside and that I occasionally have them professionally decorated with snowflakes. They laugh and let it go and I am glad now that I am old enough that I don’t have to explain every little eccentricity I exhibit.
But, I’ve saved all the tree decorations; I even have a few ornaments that were kept by my mother. When there are small children in the family again, I will resume putting up a tree. We will decorate it together and as we place the strands of icicles, one by one, just so, on the branches of a Scotch pine, I will tell them about the beautiful trees their great-grandmother made.

The Story of My Life..........So Far

A few years ago my classmates and I were asked to supply a short accounting of our lives for a class reunion 'keepsake booklet'. Hahahahahaha....yeah, right. Knowing that the person in charge of this project was really more interested in measuring our social status against her own, I wrote this summary and sent it in. It didn't make it into the booklet. That's okay. I didn't make it to the reunion, either. hahahahaha

I was born under the Jesus Saves sign that hung above the door of the East Side Rescue Mission in Flint, Michigan. Soon afterward, my mother was dragged to the gutter and shot for giving birth to a child with stuck out ears and also for leaving a stain on the sidewalk. My father, not wanting to succumb to a similar fate, escaped on a motor scooter to the badlands of Montana where he lived the remainder of his life disguised as a rodeo clown.

As for myself, I was not tightly wrapped, so I escaped my swaddling clothes, rolling downhill until I fell into the Flint River where I was buoyed up by the toxic fumes of the runoff released by the downtown General Motors plant up river. I traveled several miles downstream in this fashion, eventually coming to rest upon a raft made of empty beer cans held together by old fishing line and carp guts.

I was pulled from the water by a group of fishermen who knew the value of empty beer cans which are worth a dime apiece. Ten of them will cover the cost of a dozen fishing worms. I soon realized men were willing to purchase fishing worms rather than dig for them themselves because they are usually too busy emptying beer cans in order to throw them in the river.

So, I supported myself by selling red wigglers.

I made a comfortable living until I attained the age of seventeen when it was discovered by the fishermen that I was an actual girl. I learned that while men were silly enough to buy a dozen worms for a dollar, they were even more willing to buy other things from me at twice the price plus I didn't have to dig in the ground and get dirty.

While I was pondering this career change, a handsome man rode up in a white Dodge Charger.

“Oh, wow,” I said, “Are you Prince Charming?”
“Yes, I am. I know who you are, too. You are jailbait.”
“I’ll wear high heels. It will make me look older.”
“Well, okay. Hey, you look pretty clean, except for your hands.”
“I accidentally fell in the river last night. Usually, I’m a dirty girl.”
“Will you marry me?”
“I can’t sell enough red wigglers to support a husband. Do you have a job?”
“Yes. I am a mechanic. I can fix anything that isn’t broken.”
“Well, okay, I'll marry you. Where did that kid come from?”
“I don't know, but look, there's another one.”
“These kids sure do eat a lot.”
“Yes, and I expect one day they will need clothes, too. And we can't live under the overpass forever.”
“I have a house in the country. Let’s go live there. I will plant flowers and you can sit in the shed every weekend and drink beer and make sawdust with expensive power tools.”
“Hey. Where did those kids go?”
“I don't know, but it sure got quiet all of a sudden.”
“Ah! Who are you? You sorta remind me of a dirty girl I once knew.”
“Ah! Who said that? Oh, it’s you, the Fartist formerly known as Prince…Charming.”
“Hey, when did you get old and saggy?”
“About ten years ago. I thought you noticed.”
“No, I didn’t. According to the Husband Manual, page one, I don’t have to notice anything. Ever.”
“I hate that book. By the way, you got saggy, too.”
“I did? Where?”

THE END

How To Have A Bad Time

Attitude is everything. I went to this event expecting to be miserable and I was.

How To Have A Bad Time

I went to a garden party.
Rick Nelson wasn’t there.
There was no music of any kind.
Just mounds of Tupperware.

My hostess was a woman,
A stranger to me, I’m afraid.
I was dragged to this thing by my cousin’s wife
To benefit her Ladies Aid

That’s a thing that generates money
You give till you can’t give no more
The cash is for widows and orphans
To keep them from begging at your door.

So, I said I would go to the stupid thing
I’m sorry now I spoke up
‘Cause the very last thing I needed to buy
Was an indestructible plastic cup.

I asked, “Can’t I just give them money?”
“Must I really buy some of this crap?”
Cindy gave me a look that spoke volumes.
She said, :”Well, I can tell you’ve done missed yer nap.”

She told me to go look at the flowers
On the tables decorated so nice
There were pumpkins and gourds and harvesty things
There was no need to tell me twice.

A perky young woman with freckles
Offered me something to drink
It was orange and had things floating in it
I poured it down the sink.

Drinks festooned with floaters
Just don't appeal to me
Unless, of course, there's alcohol
That's alright with me!

So I filled a wee plate with fresh veggies
I knew they would give me the gas
But, I hoped I’d be far away from this place
When it was time to let the gas pass.

I sat down at one of the tables
And made conversation bland and polite
With a woman adorned with a hairdo
Better worn on a Halloween night.

Then I went and looked at the plastic
And debated on what I should buy
A thing that holds pickles and olives?
Or containers in endless supply?

I didn’t need or want any of it
And although the displays were appealing
Nothing there took my fancy at all
Though the choices were stacked to the ceiling.

I looked for Cindy and found her
And asked if it was time to go.
But she said, “Are you nuts? Are you kidding?
“There’s games to play, don’t cha know!”

“Oh, shit!” I said to myself.
No one said a thing about games before.
Just how much longer am I expected to suffer
Before I can flee through the door?

“I’m not playing,” I said and sat down with a plop
Next to the lady with the scary hairdo.
“I don’t blame you,” the woman mumbled.
“I don’t play those damn games, too.”

So we sat and talked about gardens
And how crappy the weather had been
While all the other ladies in the room
Passed an orange from chin to chin.

Finally, it was time to go.
I bought no Tupperware.
But, left a donation with the Ladies Aid
I was glad to get out of there!

Cindy was grumpy all the way home.
I was a Tupperware party pooper.
“This is the last time I’m bringing you!” she said.
“Woo hoo!” I thought, “ That’s super!”

You’d think that folks would know by now,
I’m not the afternoon tea party sort.
These attempts to try and civilize me
Have become somewhat of a sport.

They’ll always fail, they’ll never win
I like the way I am.
I like that I don’t play those games
Or buy things because I can.

I’m a Tupperware party pooper
But, please, don’t get me wrong
I’m not so anti-social
If the right party comes along.

If you’re gonna have a party
And invite me to join in
For cripe’s sake…play some music!
And pass around the gin.

Pink Shawls Pow Wow

On a cold morning, when I was quite young, I would take the scratchy woolen blanket from my bed, wrap it around my shoulders, and then wander into the kitchen where my father would be fixing himself a cup of instant coffee. He would look at me when I entered the room, frown a little and say, "That's Indian. Go put on your robe."

And so, I would go put on my robe.

It was quilted satin, white, with a trail of pink rosebuds around the hem and up the front. It was quite pretty, a little princess robe, cozy and wonderfully smooth to the touch. Even the buttons were covered with satin. There was nothing about that robe that any little girl would not love. And yet, I loved the scratchy woolen blanket around my shoulders more. I felt protected, surrounded by love, cradled, you might say, by that old, faded blue blanket.

I did not know all those years ago that the blanket was my first shawl. My Native American heritage was hidden from me in my younger years and so the lessons whispered to me by the ancestors were not understood by me. It wasn't until I was much older that I became aware of the significance a shawl had to a Native American female. All I knew back then, was that I was more satisfied swathed in that rough piece of wool than I was buttoned up in the smooth quilted satin.



The Pink Shawl Project began in 2003 as a way to bring awareness to Native American women of the need to be tested for breast cancer. The death rate from breast cancer in NA women is higher than the national average.

This is not a physical inferiority. Native American women are not less hardy than any other race. It is rather, a fault of culture. Traditionally raised Native American women are modest and do not, as a general rule, make an outward display of emotion. Simply put, you will never see them cry in public. You will not overhear them discussing their personal health in the check out line at the grocery store. It's just not done. They keep their miseries to themselves. Even if it kills them.

Add to the cultural restraint the handed down distrust of non-tribal authority figures, like physicians, well, it's easy to see why not being pro-active in health matters can be a death sentence for them. Self-inflicted, be that as it may.




So, something had to be done about this situation. Breast cancer is survivable. A way had to be found to get through to the women that it is good to be pro-active when it comes to health issues. A way had to be found to weave this knowledge into the traditions in a way that would make an impact on the women who upheld the traditions of the tribes.

And so the Pink Shawl Project was born.

It wasn't until the Summer of 2008 that I even became aware of the Pink Shawls. I was attending a traditional pow wow with a young friend, it was the first time either one of us had attended this particular one, and also the first time I saw the Pink Shawls.

It was not a big pow wow so it was quite easy to pick bright colored fringed shawls out from the regular displays of regalia and I wondered what they were about, especially since a couple of them had the pink ribbon loop sewn onto them. I knew what that meant of course, but it wasn't until the director of ceremonies announced that there was to be a blessing of the shawls of breast cancer patients that I made a connection.

After the blessing there would be an honor drum and any who had been affected by breast cancer, whether it was as a current patient, by surviving, by being a friend or relative of a survivor, by being a friend or relative of someone who did not survive. If you were in anyway affected by breast cancer you were invited to dance, in prayer if you so wished, around the drum.

My young friend and I were sitting at a picnic table enjoying our frybread when the director made the annoucement that the blessing was about to begin. I looked at my friend and said, "We should dance for the breast cancer patients."

She nodded in agreement, "We should. I know a few women who have beat it."

"Me, too," I said, "Two of my mother's sisters. Both have survived the five year test. One of them has survived two different battles with breast cancer."

My friend stared at me hard because this was news to her. She was acquainted with my aunts, but had not known of their struggles with the disease. "Well," she said at last, "Definitely. We will dance." So, we got up from the picnic table and started towards the arena.

Now, as I mentioned, this was a small traditional pow wow out in the middle of the woods. For a pow wow, an arena is made by cordoning off a circular area that has an entrance facing east. Always east. That is the direction of new beginnings. In the middle of the arena another circle is made of cedar posts spaced a certain distance apart with a roof made from cedar boughs. Cedar is one of the four sacred medicines. It cleanses. Once the arena is made and is cleansed, it is then sacred and must not be dishonored.

Within the bough covered center circle the drum keeps up a steady beat, most of the time accompanied by chanters or singers. If you do not like the constant sound of a drumbeat in the background, a pow wow is probably not the place for you. But, if you do attend one, eventually, as you listen, you hear less and less the beat of the drum and more and more the beat of your heart. And with the rhythm of the heart and the beat of the drum, the dancers dance around the center circle.

There were not a great many dancers that day and most of the attendees were not in regalia. Observers outnumbered participants about 4-to-1. Up to that point the dancers circling the drum in the center of the arena were sparse, to put it kindly. But, after the announcement, there was a suble shift in crowd movement towards the opening in the arena and once where there was a shyness of joining in, there was now a coming together.

Women of all ages, all shapes and sizes, blondes, brunettes, long braided hair, short curly hair. No hair. We all came together to honor and pray for those affected by breast cancer.

To one side of the arena, five women, seated on folding chairs, sat in front of their pink shawls that were spread on the ground before them. With the smudge burning the sacred medicines, the Elder blessed the shawls, embuing them with prayers of hope, comfort and healing. Infusing them with the strength the women would need to spiritually fight the cancer while the modern medicine battled the cancer cells themselves. These two warriors, spiritual strength and modern medicine, both are needed to win the cancer battle. The Elder said this.

And, it is not just the women who battle this disease, but there are men too, who are stricken with breast cancer. A second Elder, a woman, said this. She went on to explain and reassure everyone attending that it is not a weakness to seek treatment. That we are meant to care for our bodies while we have them and that testing and mammograms is a good way to do this....and that the Pink Shawls were a reminder that we must care for ourselves.

So, we were gathered at the entrance of the arena, listening while the Elders spoke, watching as the Pink Shawls were blessed. And as this was happening, the daughter of one of the breast cancer patients began to walk among us gathered women.

She touched every one of us,
most of us strangers to her.
Ever so lightly,
she touched our shoulders,
each and every one of us,
and looked us in the eye when we turned to see
who had touched us where our shawls would be.
Thank you, she was saying.
Without saying a word.
Just by a touch and a look.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for bringing your strength to my mother.
Thank you for bringing your strength to all the patients.
Thank you for bringing your prayers.
Thank you for bringing your hope.
Thank you.
I, her daughter,
thank you.

Among us women she walked,
dozens and dozens of women,
she walked among us,
touching us,
thanking us.
In return,
we tipped our heads forward slightly,
acknowledging, nodding lightly,
without saying a word.
We said.
We understand, sister.
We know.
Your mother is our mother.

The blessings ended, the Elders stopped speaking, and the drum began.
Boom.......boom.......boom...boom..boom..boomboomboomboom and so began the chanters. Hey-ya...hey....hey-ya...hey...and the drum matched the beat of our collective heart as we walked through the smudge, some of us twirling, cleansing ourselves before entering the arena. We held an offering of sema, tobacco, in our hands, to be sprinkled upon the ground as we danced, and soon we were massed as one, in a hoop around the drum center, and the arena was closed off.

And, surrounding our dancing circle of women was another circle. A hoop of our warriors, our men, ringed around us, arms outstretched holding ceremonial weapons of protection, t'hawks and batons. No one would interfere while we honored the cancer patients. No one.

We were safe....to honor.

We were free....to honor.

And, inside this safety, upon this sacred ground, in toe-heel, toe-heel steps matching the rythym of the drum heart beat...

...we danced.